


Heart's Sorrow Dwells in a Silent Wood

by demeritus



Category: Arthurian Mythology
Genre: Angst, Canon Era, Character Study, Christianity, Gen, Welsh Folklore
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-24
Updated: 2020-05-24
Packaged: 2021-03-03 06:33:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,076
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24346573
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/demeritus/pseuds/demeritus
Summary: "It is right it should be soMan was made for Joy & WoeAnd when this we rightly knowThro the World we safely goJoy & Woe are woven fineA Clothing for the soul divineUnder every grief & pineRuns a joy with silken twine"- William Blake,Auguries of Innocence
Comments: 2
Kudos: 5





	Heart's Sorrow Dwells in a Silent Wood

The land was called Cymru, or Moel Famau, or Gwynedd, depending upon who you asked, but to him it was merely _home_. More than home, it was his whole world. Distance measured in the time it took to walk from the cottage to the stream, from the stream to the apple grove to the hill with one tree on top and the hill where daffodils bloomed in the summer (he called them sunbursts, for they were golden orbs surrounded in pale halos, while sunflowers were sun-shys, for they were just peeking out behind their heads). He often followed the sun when he ventured alone, wondering what it was chasing, where it went when it left the sky, or searched for its origin, thinking perhaps he might find heaven if he walked far enough east.

Such fancies made his days since he started walking, though it was years before Mam allowed him past the garden alone. That time, especially, was filled with stories. She told him of the Lord God, who made the world in six days, and the images she spun filled his dreams - darkness yielding to soft, empty light, the bright light of heaven above the endless sky, crisp blue waters and green grass with hills rising from the land like leavened bread...She told of the Garden of Eden and the first people, who named the plants and animals themselves and lived in perfect peace and friendship. 

And though it made him uneasy, he remembered what she told him of their downfall, of the devil’s temptation and the fruit of knowledge that damned the world to sin. She returned to this lesson when he disobeyed, made him apologize and confess and pray for forgiveness. He could never quite tell whether she forgave him for his wrongs, let alone if the Lord God did, but as he grew older and spent more time alone, the less these worries stayed with him. After all, God’s blessings continued despite mankind’s mistakes - He gave Mam a child of her own to raise in harmony that he likened to Eden itself. This was because of Christ, he knew, God’s only Son who was given to Blessed Mary to raise to guide the world.

She spoke, too, of the Twyllydd Teg, the Fair Folk, who traveled from the otherworld Annwn and lived in the forest alongside wild beasts; she warned him of mushroom rings and the will-o’-the-wisps and thick mists which preceded their arrival. She bade him beware of their temptations which, like the devil in Eden, would lead him to his end. At first, she thought these stories might stop him from travelling far, but she never quibbled when he did. She knew he would always return.

As he grew, work lessons began with the garden. He had known how to carry water from the stream since he could lift a bucket, and that was still his duty every morning and every night; now he learned to fertilize the garden with the water they had used to boil their beans, how to plant sprouts and pull weeds and hoe and till. He was chief gardener for a time, when Mam decided his short stature made him better at it, but the garden never kept his attention long before he wandered off into the thickets and fields. Eventually, Mam taught him to hunt with a spear, and so he wandered the forest paths with this pretense, almost always returning before dark with some small beast, his trophies growing in size as he did. He never chased deer far, for Mam had warned him that a relentless hunt might send the hapless running into Annwn.

*

“I have a question,” the boy asked one cold winter night. He hated this season. While the snow-covered land was beautiful in its brightness, the terribly short days left him tired and worn and there was little time to wander. He would sit by the stove and hear stories, and make up stories of his own, to his Mam’s delight.

“What is it, sweet fellow?”

“If God made such a big, wide world, with oceans and mountains and deserts and plains...why have we never seen any of those places? They must be beautiful, like all of God’s creations.”

Mam looked at the boy sympathetically and sighed.

“Much like we must fear God for his power, many of his creations are to be feared as well. These distant lands and their inhabitants are dangerous, and so far away. Can you imagine walking for weeks and months only to be met with fearful beasts and unfamiliar folk?”

The boy looked down, confused and saddened, but persisted.

“Why would God make such terrible things? He loves us! And I bet I could walk far enough to see something new! I’ve been as far as the Cloud Tree at the base of Solstice Hill, that’s even past the village!”

“That _is_ quite far,” Mam said, smiling and ignoring the boy’s question. “But imagine doing that a hundred, a thousand times, and then a thousand more times, before even reaching a new land!”

“I’m gonna do it someday. I’m gonna go to the Holy Land and the place where the sun never sets, which must be the gates of heaven!”

“Sweet fellow...but then you would have to leave your home.”

The boy sunk a bit and frowned. He did love his home, but Mam’s stories told of such wonders that he craved to see himself. He spent his days marvelling at creation, at the joy of cold spring water against hot, sweaty skin, the birds singing in their own sweet language,the deep, poisonous colour of red berries and the soft, welcoming feeling of tilled soil, the endless expanse of the sky and the subtle, enrapturing terror of storm clouds. If these familiar things brought him such bliss, he could barely imagine what fresh delight the rest of the world had to offer.

As he grew, Mam bought a horse from the village, to help the boy with his hunting. Spear in hand, he could now travel faster and farther than ever before. He found standing stones which framed the sun in the mourn and the eve, high cliffs overlooking deep lakes, and wide paths trodden by horses and carts, though he did not know these paths would lead to towns and castles and other places. He dared not follow them long, and it seemed to him these paths would have done better to be covered in plants and flowers like the rest of the land. 

It was during his fifteenth summer that he encountered something new on one of these dull paths.

He was chasing a deer, and his vigor had gotten a hold of him, for he would have rode straight into Annwn and taken some time to realize where he was. He lost track of his prey when they reached an incline onto a road he had never seen before. Peering forward and up onto the hill in hopes of catching sight of the deer, his eyes were met with a blinding light like he had never before beheld. He averted his gaze and dismounted. He opened his eyes slowly until he saw two creatures, their skin silver and shining like the sun, riding upon clean white horses. Without thinking, he started walking toward them, never looking away, until they stopped and saluted him.

“You have no reason to fear us,” one of the creatures said in a deep, resonating voice. “We are travelling through this valley. Why do you kneel?”

The boy was on his knees and he barely rose from his deep bow to answer.

“I understand you are Angels, for I have met the Fair Folk and their likeness is pale to your heavenly glow!”

“What is your name, boy?”

The boy looked a bit confused.

“Mam calls me ‘sweet fellow,’” he said, smiling. 

The man looked at his companion before returning his attention to the boy.

“We are knights, and we are searching for a company of maidens that rode by here. Have you seen them?”

“I have never heard of that,” the boy said, apparently ignoring the man’s question. “What are knights?”

The knight answered the boy’s questions as well he could, all the while asking his question again. When he was met with only more questions - inquiring of the nature of his armour, his sword, his helm…The boy finally directed him to some farmers and the knight commended him to God and rode off with his companion.

The boy rode back to the cottage and walked inside in a daze. That image was still in his mind, those huge, gleaming creatures. Their clothes might be metal and their visage human, but the things the knight had spoken of...their lives, the boy thought, must be even holier than his own for their adventures.

He went to Mam in awe and told her what he had seen, and as he spoke, she wept and cried out.

“Such a life is your destiny, sweet fellow,” she said, holding her son close. “I can no longer keep you from what was meant to be, unless you would like to stay here, with me?”

The boy embraced her and cried also, wiping her tears away as she cleaned his. He told her that he would like nothing more than to become a knight, so he might see the world and honour God with his valour.

She helped him pack what he would need and dressed him in his sturdiest leathers, sending with him only a knife and spear.

Eagerness for his newfound purpose mixed with the ache of seeing Mam so sad. He promised her she would hear great tales of his adventures, but he said nothing of his return. The world being so wide, he was convinced that by noon, he would be halfway across it.

*

The absence of her child became unsettling as the sun set that evening. She made dinner - more than would feed only herself, in silence, only the sounds of owls, crickets, and frogs filtering in from outside. She ate in silence and did the evening chores in silence. She lay in bed and fell asleep when full darkness enveloped the cottage, lighting no candles, for there was no reason to stay awake. 

She awoke with the sun, but did not arise. When she was finally able to keep her eyes open, she stared forward, watching the distant sky, and listening to the silence. As her dreams faded into vague memory, the wellspring of thoughts crawled to the surface. She didn’t so much engage with them as watch them, barely acknowledging their presence.

They were thoughts of her child, of the laughter and chatter that once echoed through the cottage and resounded through the gardens and into the forest, the endless stories and questions; her joy when her sweet fellow returned at the end of the day and her frustration at the small wounds she tended at least once a week.

They were old thoughts, thoughts she had stored away for fifteen years, of her former home and the man she had loved; her loneliness when he left on a quest and her relief every time he returned, until the day he failed to do so. She put aside her despair and anger then, the hatred she had developed for the life of a warrior, and she vowed that her child would never know of such painful things.

These memories swirled in her mind until she fell back asleep. She awoke again around midday and made herself work; she still needed water, to tend the garden and sweep the floor, and eventually, go to the village for supplies. She kept herself busy, pushing away thoughts of if her child was safe so alone and so far away…

As days passed and she had gotten out of the habit of praying, she decided she would leave as well. It would be dangerous to travel alone, but if she could find her sister, or the daughter she had sent to her cousin, though his life was painful and his lands in ruin…

She passed another evening in silence, and as her thoughts drifted to the future, she wept for the life she could never again live, and for the life of sorrow and woe she had watched her youngest child run toward with a joyful smile and an open heart.

**Author's Note:**

> Herzeleide, or Heart's Sorrow, is the name of Percival's mother in Wolfram von Eschenbach's poem _Parzival_ and Richard Wagner's opera _Parsifal_.


End file.
